It's an amazing feeling for me when I have a much better experience reading a book the second time around. Maybe bringing plays into it complicates things, but I just read "A Streetcar Named Desire" and couldn't fathom why it had had no effect on me in college. Of course, I decided that I am a much more mature, aware, multi-faceted person now. That was mostly a good feeling, but also a little sobering, because I want to have respect for my old self. I don't want to be divorced from my experiences.
If an old favorite doesn't do it for me on a current read, I can likewise accept that, but sometimes I am nagged by the feeling that I must not have tried hard enough. There is an element of "If it's not you, it's me," in reading, and all such combinations of attribution, with the book taking the place of another person. There is pressure with a second read when you loved the book the first time. And the same way, I feel pressure when I'm reading anything by a favorite author, worrying that the current book won't live up to the previous ones. I generally like the first books I read by an author best. Sometimes I can't objectively say those books were any better than the later ones, but they have a special place in my heart. There was an excitement with them and an experience of discovery that there couldn't have been with the later books.
So, if we change as people, and don't like some of the same things we did earlier, presumably because we have changed, does that mean that we won't like some of our own earlier writing? It seems this would be much more jarring than maybe not liking someone else's book anymore.
I've accidentally reread entire books I read many years ago, without realizing I was rereading, until I went to track what I'd read and realized it was already on my list. It was like enjoying it all over again. If I learn something new, it's productive. If I'm enjoying the book as much as ever, well, why not reread it?
5 overdue books - the sign of a wonderful writer -
It's an amazing feeling for me when I have a much better experience reading a book the second time around. Maybe bringing plays into it complicates things, but I just read "A Streetcar Named Desire" and couldn't fathom why it had had no effect on me in college. Of course, I decided that I am a much more mature, aware, multi-faceted person now. That was mostly a good feeling, but also a little sobering, because I want to have respect for my old self. I don't want to be divorced from my experiences.
If an old favorite doesn't do it for me on a current read, I can likewise accept that, but sometimes I am nagged by the feeling that I must not have tried hard enough. There is an element of "If it's not you, it's me," in reading, and all such combinations of attribution, with the book taking the place of another person. There is pressure with a second read when you loved the book the first time. And the same way, I feel pressure when I'm reading anything by a favorite author, worrying that the current book won't live up to the previous ones. I generally like the first books I read by an author best. Sometimes I can't objectively say those books were any better than the later ones, but they have a special place in my heart. There was an excitement with them and an experience of discovery that there couldn't have been with the later books.
So, if we change as people, and don't like some of the same things we did earlier, presumably because we have changed, does that mean that we won't like some of our own earlier writing? It seems this would be much more jarring than maybe not liking someone else's book anymore.
I've accidentally reread entire books I read many years ago, without realizing I was rereading, until I went to track what I'd read and realized it was already on my list. It was like enjoying it all over again. If I learn something new, it's productive. If I'm enjoying the book as much as ever, well, why not reread it?